PayPal cutting roughly 20 percent of its nearly 24,000 employees, Block cutting around 4,000 roles, Intuit cutting about 3,000, Coinbase cutting 14 percent of its workforce, Robinhood cutting 10 percent. At that scale, most US fintech layoffs in 2026 clear the legal thresholds that trigger specific notice and disclosure obligations, yet most laid-off employees never check whether their employer actually met them. This is general information on US employment law, not legal advice for your specific situation, so verify the details with your state labor department or an employment attorney before you sign anything.
The WARN Act: the one real notice requirement
The federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act requires employers with 100 or more full-time employees to give 60 days' written notice before a plant closing or mass layoff, defined as 50 or more employees at a single site making up at least a third of that site's workforce, or 500 or more employees regardless of percentage. A round of cuts in the thousands, like the ones named above, is almost always large enough to trigger WARN at the sites affected. If your employer gave you less than 60 days' notice and doesn't fall under a recognized exception (unforeseeable business circumstances, natural disaster, or the "faltering company" exception), you may be owed back pay and benefits for the shortfall.
Severance is not legally required, and that matters
Unlike the UK, the US has no statutory severance pay requirement at all. Severance in the US is either a contractual promise (in your offer letter or an employment agreement) or a discretionary payment the company chooses to make, often conditioned on signing a release of legal claims. That release is the actual negotiation point: companies want it, and that gives you leverage to ask for more than the initial offer, especially if you have equity, a long tenure, or a plausible WARN Act notice shortfall to point to.
State law can require more than federal law does
Several states, including California, New York, and New Jersey, have their own "mini-WARN" acts with lower employee-count thresholds or longer notice periods than the federal law, and New Jersey's version specifically mandates severance pay for qualifying layoffs, which is unusual in the US. If you were laid off in one of these states, check the state-specific rule separately from the federal one, since the state version is often more generous.
COBRA and health coverage
Under COBRA, you can generally keep your employer health plan for up to 18 months after a layoff, but you pay the full premium yourself, employer plus employee share, often three to four times what you were paying as an employee. Some severance packages include a few months of employer-paid COBRA as part of the offer; if yours doesn't, it's a reasonable ask.
Unemployment insurance
Layoffs (as opposed to for-cause terminations) almost always qualify for state unemployment insurance, but eligibility and benefit amounts vary significantly by state, and accepting a severance package doesn't necessarily disqualify you, though a few states delay the start date of benefits until severance pay runs out. File as soon as your employment ends rather than waiting to see what severance is offered.
Where the actual negotiation room is
Beyond the base severance number, the real leverage points are the release terms (what claims you're giving up), unvested equity acceleration, extended COBRA subsidy, and outplacement support, none of which are guaranteed by law and all of which are negotiable before you sign. If your layoff was part of a round in the thousands, a shortfall against WARN Act notice is worth raising explicitly, since it converts into real back pay, not just goodwill.
What to do next
Check your notice period and severance offer against the thresholds above before signing anything, and don't let a tight deadline rush you past that step. Set up job alerts for roles matching your background and benchmark your next offer before you accept it. For the broader picture on why 2026's cuts happened in the first place, see Fintech Layoffs 2026: Record Job Cuts, and for which of the same companies are hiring again right now, see which fintechs are actually hiring for AI roles.